Marine Training and Employment (River Thames)

Debate between Simon Hughes and Baroness Hoey

Friday 22nd October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) (Lab)]

rose—

[Simon Hughes]

If I can delay the hon. Lady a moment, I will make another point.

We need to make sure that the price of development land does not price out such activities. Therefore, there is a planning issue for central Government and local Government. When the localism Bill is introduced later in the Session, we need to ensure that central Government and the London government have the necessary powers. We need to ensure that the PLA has the powers to retain yards, if it needs them, and that we do not lose any more sites.

Another point—I think this is the matter on which the hon. Lady wants to intervene—is that we do not have enough qualified people with local navigational knowledge as boatmen on the river. Therefore, during times of peak tourist demand, not enough people are available to run all the boats on the river. In this age, we must not introduce regulations that make it impossible for those who have traditionally worked on the river to retain their qualifications. We must not lose their skills.

[Kate Hoey]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman, my friend and constituency neighbour, on his chairmanship of the successful Mayor’s Thames festival. I agree with all his comments, and I am particularly concerned about the seemingly unnecessary extra regulation, which is being interpreted by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. Skilled, experienced boat masters, whose standards of safety should make us proud, are being asked to go and take examinations again. For many of them, that is quite insulting. Will he join me in urging the Minister to ask the MCA to engage constructively with Thames boat masters to reach a solution that preserves their existing skills and experience and does not subject them to something that is not legally necessary and does not happen in other inland waterways?

[Simon Hughes]

I will not repeat the hon. Lady’s point: I hope that the Minister will take up the matter with colleagues across Government. I am not arguing for a deskilled or less skilled work force—I was my constituency’s MP at the time the Marchioness sank, and the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), whom I also much respect on these matters, also remembers those days. We need a highly skilled work force, but we also need to use the skills that are historically acquired, because the Thames is a dangerous river to work on.

People sometimes underestimate the strength of the tides and currents, which are extremely dangerous and can be fatal, as was seen at the time of the Marchioness and has been seen on occasions since. It is vital that we retain our current work force, but also build a new generation to take the jobs.